Early African Church

The name, Early African Church, is given to the Christian communities inhabiting the region known politically as Roman Africa, and comprised geographically within the following limits, namely: the Mediterranean littoral between Cyrenaica on the east and the river Ampsaga (now the Rummel) on the west; that part of it which faces the Atlantic Ocean being called Mauretania. These Christian communities, apparently, extended only as far as the neighbourhood of Tangiers (Tangi). The evangelization of Africa followed much the same lines as those traced by Roman civilization. Starting from Carthage, it overran Proconsular Africa and Numidia, and grew less thorough as it drew near to Mauretania.

History

The delimitation of the ecclesiastical boundaries of the African Church is a matter of great difficulty. Again and again the Roman political authority rearranged the provincial divisions, and on various occasions the ecclesiastical authorities conformed the limits of their respective jurisdictions to those of the civil power. These limits, however, were not only liable to successive rectification, but in some cases they were not even clearly marked. Parts of Mauretania always remained independent; the mountainous region to the west of the Aure (Middle Atlas), and the plateau above the Tell never became Roman. The high lands of the Sahara and all the country west of the Atlas range were inhabited by the nomad tribes of the Getuli, and there are neither churches nor definite ecclesiastical organizations to be found there. Christianity filtered in, so to speak, little by little. Bishoprics were founded among the converts, as the need for them arose; were moved, possibly, from place to place, and disappeared, without leaving a trace of their existence. The historical period of the African Church begins in 180 with groups of martyrs. At a somewhat later date the writings of Tertullian tell us how rapidly African Christianity had grown. It had passed the Roman military lines, and spread among the peoples to the south and southeast of the Aure. About the year 200 there was a violent persecution at Carthage and in the provinces held by the Romans. We gain information as to its various phases from the martyrdom of St. Perpetua and the treatises of Tertullian. Christianity, however, did not even then cease to make distant conquests; Christian epitaphs are to be found at Aumale, dated 227, and at Tipasa, dated 238. These dates are assured. If we rely on texts less definite, yet of great value, we may admit that the evangelization of Northern Africa began very early. By the opening of the third century there was a large Christian population in the towns and even in the country districts, which included not only the poor, but also persons of the highest rank. A council held at Carthage about the year 220 was attended by eighteen bishops from the province of Numidia. Another council, held in the time of St. Cyprian, about the middle of the third century, was attended by eighty-seven bishops. At this period the African Church went through a very grave crisis. The long peace had caused the faithful to relax the virtues needed in times of persecution. The Emperor Decius published an edict, the effect of which was to make many martyrs and confessors, and not a few apostates. A certain bishop, followed by his whole community, was to be seen sacrificing to the gods. The apostates (see LAPSI) and the timid who had bought a certificate of apostasy for money (see Libellatici) became so numerous as to fancy that they could lay down the law to the Church, and demand their restoration to ecclesiastical communion, a state of affairs which gave rise to controversies and deplorable troubles. Yet the Church of Africa had martyrs, even at such a time. The names of St. Cyprian of Carthage, of the martyrs of Massa Candida, of Theogenes of Hippo, Agapius and Secundus at Cirta, of James, Marianus, and others; of Lucian, Montanus, and their companions, showed that there were still brave and sincere Christians to be found in her fold. The persecutions at the end of the third, and at the beginning of the fourth, century did not only make martyrs; they also gave rise to a heresy which claimed that Christians could deliver the sacred books and the archives of the Church to the officers of the State, without lapsing from the faith.

The accession of Constantine found the African Church rent by controversies and heresies; Catholics and Donatists contended not only in wordy warfare, but also in a violent and sanguinary way. A law of Constantine (318) deprived the Donatists of their churches, most of which they had taken from the Catholics. They had, however, grown so powerful that even such a measure failed to crush them; so numerous were they that a Donatist Council, held at Carthage, in 327, was attended by 270 bishops. Attempts at reconciliation, suggested by the Emperor Constantius, only widened the breach, and led to armed repression, an ever-growing disquiet, and an enmity that became more and more embittered. Yet, in the very midst of these troubles, the Primate of Carthage, Gratus, declared (in the year 349): "God has restored Africa to religious unity." Julian's accession (361) and his permission to all religious exiles to return to their homes added to the troubles of the African Church. A Donatistbishop sat in the heretical see of Carthage, in opposition to the orthodoxbishop. One act of violence followed another and begot new conflicts. About this period, Optatus, Bishop of Milevi, began to combat the sect by his writings. A few years later, St. Augustine, converted at Milan, returned to his native land, and entered the lists against every kind of error. Paganism had by that time ceased to be a menace; in 399 the temples were closed at Carthage. Nevertheless the energy and genius of Augustine were abundantly occupied in training the clergy and instructing the faithful, as well as in theological controversy with the heretics. For forty years, from 390 to 430, the Councils of Carthage (see African Synods), which reunited a great part of the African Episcopate, public discussions with the Donatists, sermons, homilies, scriptural commentaries, followed almost without interval; an unparalleled activity which had commensurate results. The Pelagianheresy, which had made great strides in Africa, was condemned at the Council of Carthage in 412. Donatism, also, and Semi-Pelagianism (see DONATISM, PELAGIANISM) were stricken to death at an hour when political events of the utmost gravity changed the history and the destiny of the African Church. Boniface, Count of Africa, had summoned the Vandals to Africa in 426, and by 429 the invasion was completed. The barbarians advanced rapidly and made themselves masters of cities and provinces. In 430 St. Augustine died, during the siege of Hippo; nine years later Geiserich, King of the Vandals, took possession of Carthage. Then began for the African Church an era of persecution of a kind hitherto unknown. The Vandals were Arians and sectaries. Not only did they wish to establish their own Ariansect, but they were bent on the destruction of Catholicism. The churches which the invasion had left standing were either transferred to the Arians or withdrawn from the Catholics and closed to public worship. The intervention of the Emperor Zeno (474-491) and the conclusion of a treaty of peace with Geiserich, were followed by a transient calm. The churches were opened, and the Catholics were allowed to choose a bishop (476), but the death of Geiserich, and the edict of Hunnerich, in 484, made matters worse than before. A contemporary writer, Victor of Vita, has told us what we know of this long history of the Vandalpersecution. Even in such a condition of peril, the Christians of Africa were far from showing those virtues which might be looked for in a time of persecution. It is true that Salvius of Marseilles is prone to exaggeration in all that he says, but he gives us a most deplorable, and not wholly inaccurate, account of the crimes of all kinds which made Africa one of the most wretched provinces in the world. Nor had the Vandals escaped the effects of this moral corruption, which slowly destroyed their power and eventually effected their ruin. During the last years of Vandal rule in Africa, St. Fulgentius, Bishop of Ruspe, exercised a fortunate influence over the princes of the dynasty, who were no longer ignorant barbarians, but whose culture, wholly Roman and Byzantine, equalled that of their native subjects. Yet the Vandal monarchy, which had lasted for nearly a century, seemed less firmly established than at its beginning. Hilderich, who succeeded Thrasamond in 523, was too cultured and too mild a prince to impose his will on others. Gilimer made an attempt to deprive him of power, and, proclaimed King of the Vandals in 531, marched on Carthage and dethroned Hilderich. His cause appeared to be completely successful, and his authority firmly established, when a Byzantine fleet appeared off the coast of Africa. The naval battle of Decimum (13 September, 533) destroyed, in a few hours, the sea power of the Vandals. The landing of the Byzantine army, the taking of Carthage, the flight of Gilimer, and the battle of Tricamarum, about the middle of December, completed their destruction and their disappearance.

The victor, Belisarius, had but to show himself in order to reconquer the greater part of the coast, and to place the cities under the authority of the Emperor Justinian. A council held at Carthage in 534 was attended by 220 bishops representing all the churches. It issued a decree forbidding the public exercise of Arian worship. The establishment of Byzantine rule, however, was far from restoring unity to the African Church. The Councils of Carthage brought together the bishops of Proconsular Africa, Byzacena, and Numidia, but those of Tripolitana and Mauretania were absent. Mauretania had, in fact, regained its political autonomy, during the Vandal period. A native dynasty had been set up, and the Byzantine army of occupation never succeeded in conquering a part of the country so far from their base at Carthage.

The reign of Justinian marks a sad period in the history of the African Church, due to the part taken by the clergy in the matter known as that of the Tria Capitula. While one part of the episcopate wasted its time and energies in fruitless theological discussions, others failed of their duty. It was under these circumstances that Pope Gregory the Great sent men to Africa, whose lofty character contributed greatly to increase the prestige of the Roman Church. The notary Hilarus became in some sense a papal legate with authority over the African Bishops. He left them in no doubt as to their duty, instructed or reprimanded them, and summoned councils in the Pope's name. With the help of the metropolitan of Carthage, he succeeded in restoring unity, peace, and ecclesiastical discipline in the African Church, which drew strength from so fortunate a change even so surely as the See of Rome regained in respect and authority. This renewal of vigour, however, was not of long duration. The Arabs, who had conquered Egypt, made their way into Africa. In 642 they occupied Barca and Cyrenaica; in 643 they conquered part of the Tripolitana. In 647 the Caliph Othman gave orders for a direct attack on Africa, and an army which had gained a victory at Sbeitla withdrew on payment of a large ransom. Some years of respite ensued. The African Church showed its firm attachment to orthodoxy by remaining loyal to Pope Martin I (649-655) in his conflict with the Emperor of Byzantium. The last forty years of the seventh century witnessed the gradual fall of the fragments of Byzantine Africa into the hands of the Arabs. The Berber, or native tribes, which before this had seemed on the way to conversion to the Gospel, passed in a short time, and without resistance, to Islam. Carthage was taken by the Arabs in 695. Two years later it was re-entered by the Patrician John, but only for a brief period; in 698 Hassan once more took possession of the capital of Northern Africa. In this overwhelming disaster of the Arab invasion the Churches of Africa were blotted out. Not that all was destroyed, but that remnant of Christian life was so small as to be matter for erudition rather than for history.

Christian literature of Africa

The ecclesiastical literature of Christian Africa is the most important of Latin Christian literatures. The first name which presents itself is that of Tertullian, an admirable writer, much of whose work we still possess, notwithstanding the lacunae due to lost writings. Such works as the "Passio S. Perpetuae" have been attributed to him, but the great apologist stands so complete that he has no need to borrow from others. Not that Tertullian is always remarkable for style, ideas, and theology, but he has furnished matter for very suggestive studies. His style, indeed, is often exaggerated, but his faults are those of a period not far removed from the great age of Latin literature. Nor are all his ideas alike novel and original, so that what seems actually to be his own gains in importance on that very account. In contradistinction to the apologists of, and before, his time, Tertullian refused to make Christianapologetics merely defensive; he appealed to the law of the Empire, claimed the right to social existence, and took the offensive. His theology is sometimes daring, and even inaccurate; his morality inadmissible through very excess. Some of the treatises which have come down to us were written after he had become separated from the Church; yet, whatever verdict may be passed upon this great man, his works remain among the most valuable of Christian antiquity. The lawyer, Minucius Felix, has shown so much literary skill in his short treatises of a few pages that he has deservedly attained to fame. The correspondence, treatises, and sermons of St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, belong approximately to the middle of the third century, the correspondence forming one of the most valuable sources for the history of Christianity in Africa and the West during his time. His relations with the Church of Rome, the councils of Carthage, his endless disputes with the African bishops, take the place, to some extent, of the lost documents of the period. St. Cyprian, indeed, although an orator before he became a bishop, is not Tertullian's equal in the matter of style. His treatises are well composed, and written with art; they do not, however, contain that inexhaustible abundance of views and perspectives which are the sole privilege of certain very lofty minds. Arnobius, the author of an apology for Christianity, is of a secondary interest; Lactantius, more cultured and more literary, only belongs to Africa by reason of the richness of his genius. The peculiar bent of his talent is purely Ciceronian, nor was he trained in the schools of his native land. Among these, each of whom has his name and place, there moved others, almost unknown, or hidden under an impenetrable anonymousness. Writings collected among the Spuria of Latin literature have been sometimes attributed to Tertullian, sometimes to St. Cyprian, or even to Pope Victor, the contemporary of the Emperor Commodus; they need not, however, detain us here. Other authors, again, such as Maximius of Madaura and Victorinus, stand, with Optatus of Milevi, in the front rank of African literature in the fourth century, before the appearance of St. Augustine.

The literary labours of St. Augustine are so closely connected with his work as a bishop, that it is difficult, at the present time, to separate one from the other. He wrote not for the sake of writing, but for the sake of doing. From the year 386 onward, his treatises appeared every year. Such profuseness is often detrimental to their literary worth; but what is more injurious, however, was his own carelessness concerning beauty of form, of which he hardly ever seems to think in his solicitude about other things. His one aim above all else is to ensure conviction; the result is that we owe to the mere splendour of his genius the few beautiful passages which have fallen from his pen. It is to the loftiness of his thought, rather than to the culture of his mind, that we owe certain pages which are admirable, but not perfect. The language of Augustine was Latin indeed, but a Latin that had already entered on its decline. His desire was to be understood, not to be admired, which explains the shortcomings of his work in respect of style. But when from his style we pass to his thoughts, we may admire almost unreservedly. Even here we find occasional traces of bad taste, but it is the taste of his period: florid, fond of glitter, puns, refinements—in a word, of the weaknesses of contemporary Latin. Of all St. Augustine's vast labours those which hold the first place, as they hold one of the first among Christian writings, are: The "Confessions," the "City of God," and the "Commentary on the Gospel of St. John." As regards theology, his works gave Christianity an impulse the effect of which was felt for centuries; the doctrine of the Trinity supplied him with matter for the most finished exposition to be found among the works of the Doctors of the Church. Other writers, theologians, poets, or historians, are to be met with after St. Augustine's time, but their names, honourable as they are, cannot compare in fame with the great ones which we have recorded as belonging to the third and fourth centuries. The endeavour of St. Fulgentius, Bishop of Ruspe, is to think and write as a faithful disciple of St. Augustine. Dracontius, a meritorious poet, lacks elevation; only an occasional line deserves a place among the poetry which does not die. Victor of Vita, an impetuous historian, makes us sometimes wish, in presence of his too literary descriptions, for the monotonous simplicity of the chronicles, with their rigorous exactness. In the theological or historical writings of Facundus of Hermiane, Verecundus, and Victor of Tunnunum, may be found bursts of passion not wholly without merit from a literary standpoint, but which not seldom leave us doubtful as to the historical accuracy of their narratives or their reminiscences.

The writings of African authors, e.g. Tertullian and St. Augustine, are full of quotations drawn from the Sacred Scriptures. These fragmentary texts are among the most ancient witnesses to the Latin Bible, and are of great importance, not only in connection with the formation of the style and vocabulary of the Christian writers of Africa, but also in regard to the establishment of the biblical text. Africa is represented at the present day by a group of texts in which is preserved a version commonly known as the "African Version" of the New Testament. It may now be taken as certain that there never existed in early Christian Africa an official Latin text known to all the Churches, or used by the faithful to the exclusion of all others. The African bishops willingly allowed corrections to be made in a copy of the Sacred Scriptures, or even a reference, when necessary, to the Greek text. With some exceptions, it was the Septuagint text that prevailed, for the Old Testament, until the fourth century. In the case of the New, the manuscripts were of the western type. (See Bible, Canon.) On this basis there arose a variety of translations and interpretations. This well-established fact as to the existence of a number of versions of the Bible in Africa does not imply, however, that there was no one version more widely used and more generally received than the rest, i.e. the version which is found nearly complete in the works of St. Cyprian. Yet even this version was not without rivals. Apart from the discrepancies to be found in two quotations of the same text in the works of two different authors, and sometimes of the same author, we now know that of several books of Scripture there were versions wholly independent of each other. No fewer than three different versions of Daniel are to be found in use in Africa during the third century; in the middle of the fourth, the DonatistTychonius uses and collates two versions of the Apocalypse.

Liturgy

The liturgy of the African Church is known to us from the writings of the Fathers, but there exists no complete work, no liturgical book, belonging to it. The writings of Tertullian, of St. Cyprian, of St. Augustine are full of valuable indications which permit us to conclude that the liturgy of Africa presented many and characteristic points of contact with the liturgy of the Roman Church. The liturgical year comprised the feasts in honour of Our Lord and a great number of feasts of martyrs, which are offset by certain days of penance. Africa, however, does not seem to have conformed rigorously, in this matter, with what was else customary. The station days. The fast of these days was not continued beyond the third hour after noon. Easter in the African Church had the same character as in other Churches; it continued to draw a part of the year into its orbit by fixing the date of Lent and of the Paschal season, while Pentecost and the Ascension likewise gravitated around it. Christmas and the Epiphany were kept clearly apart, and had fixed dates. The cultus of the martyrs is not always to be distinguished from that of the dead, and it is only by degrees that the line was drawn between the martyrs who were to be invoked and the dead who were to be prayed for. The prayer (petition) for a place of refreshment, refrigerium, bears witness to the belief of an interchange of help between the living and the departed. In addition, moreover, to the prayer for the dead, we find in Africa the prayer for certain classes of the living. (See African Liturgy.)

Dialects

Several languages were used simultaneously by the people of Africa; the northern part seems at first to have been a Latin-speaking country. Indeed, previous to, and during the first centuries of, our era we find there a flourishing Latin literature, many schools, and famous rhetoricians. However, Greek was currently spoken at Carthage in the second century; some of Tertullian's treatises were written also in Greek. The steady advance of Roman civilization caused the neglect and abandonment of that tongue. At the beginning of the third century an African, chosen at random, would have expressed himself more easily in Greek than in Latin; two hundred years later, St. Augustine and the poet Dracontius had at best but a slight knowledge of Greek. As to local dialects, we know little. No work of Christian literature written in Punic has come down to us, though there can be no doubt but that the clergy and faithful used a language much spoken in Carthage and in the coast towns of the Proconsular Province. The lower and middle classes spoke Punic, and the Circumcellion heretics were to be among the last of its defenders. The Christian writers almost wholly ignore the native Libyan, or Berber, dialect. St. Augustine, indeed, tells us that this speech was only in use among the nomad tribes.

Contact information. The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is webmaster at newadvent.org. Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.